John Dolan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Ó Céidigh for giving me the opportunity to speak. He is under pressure too. I was a member of the board of the National Disability Authority for a number of years. We received welcome news from the Government yesterday on the ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. I draw people's attention to Article 9 on accessibility to the physical environment, transportation, information and communications, including information and communication technologies, and so forth. It refers to both urban and rural. The rural conundrum has been mentioned already. We will ratify the convention in a month or two. I believe the work the committee has been doing already in the space around accessibility puts one in a good place to drive and keep that theme. We have had meetings with people with disabilities as witnesses and participants. It gives an edge to the proceedings. It is a different environment from the one we are in today, but we are all committed to the same thing. Getting things moved forward means nothing to somebody with a disability who cannot depend on a service today.

With regard to Ms Barron's presentation, it is unfair but I will try to distil it down to where we are and what needs to happen. She made a few key statements. She referred to the various Departments and agencies involved. This theme is in the remit of the National Transport Authority as well. She said the NDA advises cross-departmental working and she referred to the importance of getting full implementation of all the actions already agreed. There is a gap between action and moving it to execution. How big a boost would it be to this project if the various Departments and entities, and this encompasses local authorities, transport, private operators and others, were to work together in a more coherent and determined way? With ratification of the convention approaching, getting folk together in a determined way across the different silos in which they normally work would be important. Transport accessibility is key to a range of other things. We do not need to labour that other than to mention training, employment and other services. Does she have a view on that?

Due to the time constraints I will move to Ms Graham's presentation. I thank her for it and for the work the authority is doing. She said when replying to a question that we have a low level of accessibility outside the cities. It is helpful to say that in simple language. That is the case not just for people with disabilities but also for older people and people who live outside the big cities. We should remember that. Giving 24 hours notice does not mean that it works. Two of the five wheelchair users who turned up for the pilot presentation about the four hour scheme for the DART on Monday could not get there or could not get home.

There is another question. It is not a tricky question but it is not a two plus two equals four question. Deputy O'Keeffe asked how long more it will take and Ms Graham said that depends on how much comes out of the State's pocket. Ms Graham might not be able to answer this question but it would be useful if she could advise the committee on it. Given the trend that has been in place over the last number of years and the amount of money that has been available to deal with the accessibility project, how long would it take if that was the continuing trend? She might have footnotes to that because she might say there is an indication that it will be improved or whatever, but taking the baseline that we keep going at the current level, in what year and century will this be sorted? That would be useful for us.

I have a similar question for the NTA to the one I put to the NDA. The NTA has a remit to develop the provision of integrated public transport services and integrated accessible transport systems within the Dublin area. What are the different stakeholders that have to be involved, such as local authorities and so forth? Again, could we pump up the work by the different agencies? I have a range of other questions but I will not ask them.